"Among Us" Stole the Spotlight at "The Game Awards 2020"
Among Us Wins "Mobile Game of the Year" and Reveals New Map At "The Game Awards 2020"
Among Us, the sleeper hit App of 2020, emerged as the winner of the prestigious 'Mobile Game of the Year' award at the 2020 edition of The Game Awards. At the same ceremony, InnerSloth unveiled a trailer for their new map: The Airship.
The Win
Among Us defeated some serious competition in order to take home the prestigious Mobile Game of the Year award, beating out Call of Duty: Mobile, Pokemon Cafe Mix, Genshin Impact, and Legends of Runeterra. These were all huge games, built by major studios with decades of experience.
However, when you get right down to it, the win isn't a surprise. Among Us has emerged as a cultural touchstone in 2020, played by millions and watched by even more on Twitch and other streaming services. The game even made it into politics, with Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar playing the game live on Twitch and using it as part of Get Out the Vote operations.
The Surprise Hit
What is perhaps most interesting about the success of Among Us is that it seemed to have come out of nowhere. Indeed, the 2020 Mobile Game of the Year wasn't even released in 2020 - it came out back in 2018. The casual indie game performed fine on the charts but was not the runaway hit that it eventually transformed into. That transformation occurred earlier this year when streamers began to broadcast their playthroughs of the game, exposing it to a much larger audience. Among Us shot off like a rocket, climbing to the top of the App download charts and earning even more prestigious streamers on Twitch and YouTube.
The game's popularity can be traced to it social components and thrilling use of deception.
The survival game's popularity can be traced to it social components and thrilling use of deception. In the game, up to ten players play on one of three maps. The goal of the crewmates is to complete tasks and avoid being killed by up to three imposters. The imposters are randomly selected at the start of every game. After a player is killed and their body is found or an emergency meeting is held, players chat and then vote off who they think is the imposter. If all imposters are discovered and voted off, or if all tasks are completed, the crewmates win. If the number of crewmates equals the number of Imposters, the imposters get the victory.
Among Us is popular for all of these reasons. Like the real-world versions of Mafia or Werewolf, it involves deception, strategy, planning, and social engineering. Screaming "IT WASN'T ME HE DID IT!" isn't enough to be successful in this game, and players are forced to make alliances with others, develop persuasion tactics, and use deception if they want to win the game.
The New Map
At the moment, Among Us has three maps:
- The Skeld, a wide map that seems to take place on board a spaceship.
- Polus, which intermixes a laboratory and snowy conditions
- MIRA HQ, the smallest map that seems to take place above a volcano
However, at The Game Awards 2020, Among Us made it official: A new map was on the way. This map is The Airship, or specifically, the Tophat Airship. It has a variety of new features, including new tasks, multiple levels that require ladders and elevators, varying spawn points, and more.
The map is expected to premiere in early 2021.
It's worth noting that this is the first new map of the game since its introduction in June 2018. Originally, InnerSloth planned on releasing Among Us 2, but after the runaway success of the game, they decided to focus on addressing bugs and hacking issues within the main game. From there, they began to work on a new map, and the fruit of the labor will soon be playing for all.